MQM-Pakistan completes a turbulent year trying to stay relevant

A year has passed since Pakistan-based Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) leaders and parliamentarians announced distancing themselves from party founder Altaf Hussain after his August 22 anti-state speech, with the decision to stop running the party from London.

But the year proved very challenging for Farooq Sattar’s MQM-Pakistan faction. Still reeling from the Karachi operation launched in September 2013, the party faced a number of challenges, from razing and closing of its central headquarters and sector and unit offices to arresting of party leaders and members.

The most important challenge, however, was to keep party workers and supporters away from Hussain’s personality clout as well as to keep the party intact in a situation when Mustafa Kamal and Anis Qaimkhani’s offshoot Pak Sarzameen Party (PSP) attracted a number of lawmakers and members initially provided with an identity by the MQM.

While MQM-P leaders acknowledged that it was not an easy year for them, they claimed managing to keep the party intact.

MQM-P’s central leader Syed Aminul Haque told The News that after the split the Pakistan faction had adopted several revolutionary changes and made party policies through a consultative and democratic process.

“We gradually took party cadres and supporters into confidence who understand that all these decisions were taken in the interest of the party, the Urdu-speaking community, the vote bank, Karachi and Pakistan. It was the reason we have kept peace within the MQM intact.”

The MQM-P has amended the party’s constitution, removing powers of the party’s founder and also abolishing its notorious sector and unit system to introduce an organisational structure at district and union committee levels similar to other mainstream political parties.

On the electoral front, the party lost two by-polls – for the PS-127 (Karachi-XXXIX) and the PS-114 (Karachi-XXVI) constituencies – during the year, but won the by-elections in six union committees this April.

MQM-P leaders believe that the significant votes the party bagged in the two by-polls has proven that the Urdu-speaking community continues to support the party even in the face of Hussain’s calls for boycott.

“Both the by-polls helped the party escape from Hussain’s shadow and influence that he had on the votes of the Urdu-speaking community,” said Haque. “Now our eyes are on the 2018 general elections in which we shall again make a clean sweep of the province’s urban centres.”But political observers believe that the vote bank of the Urdu-speaking community is apparently split and future trends will be clear ahead of the general elections.

“There is widespread voter apathy among the community,” said Farhan Siddiqi, a political analyst and author of ‘The Politics of Ethnicity in Pakistan’.“They are concerned about development work in their areas because of not transferring powers to the elected representatives. It is creating a sense of deprivation among the community members and re-imposing the ‘Mohajir’ slogan.”

The MQM-P has organised a multi-party conference in Karachi on August 22 (today), mainly aimed at finding solutions to the city’s problems, for which it has invited two other Urdu-speaking parties: the PSP and the MQM-Haqiqi.

MQM-H Chairman Afaq Ahmed along with MQM-P leader Amir Khan addressing a press conference.

However, a section of analysts believes that since its inception, the MQM has operated around the personal clout of Hussain.

Obed Pasha, a political analyst who lectures in public policy at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, told The News that MQM without Hussain was impossible as long as the founder was alive. “Anything short of that won’t work. Only after he’s gone will people look towards the MQM-P.”

Meanwhile, although the MQM-P succeeded in stopping most of its members from joining the PSP, it failed when it came to lawmakers Shaikh Abdullah and Irtiza Khalil Farooqui.Analysts believe that the PSP is neither here nor there because of clever intrigue of the MQM-P leadership of visibly disconnecting from the London leadership.

Moreover, regarding the ongoing operation against criminals and terrorists in the city, a paramilitary official said they had arrested only those MQM members who were involved in violence and not its peaceful activists. “Hussain is now history. We shall not tolerate anyone associated with his group.”

Separately, The News has learnt that the MQM-P is likely to get back its “legal” offices with the exception of its headquarters Nine Zero in return for its support to the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz during the parliamentary vote for electing the new prime minister.

Confirming the information, Haque said the party’s Nawabshah zone office had recently been reopened. “We are hopeful that more offices in Karachi and Hyderabad will be given back in the coming days after submitting their legal records.”

MQM-P delegation led by Amir Khan meets Pak Sarzameen Party leaders in Karachi on August 21.